Hook—Line—& Sinking
by jiemae
Summary: I'll wait. I'll wait. There's very little I won't do for you. [OC Insert]
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** For a long time, I've been such a big fan of Tokyo Ghoul (literally since it first started getting fantraslated after my friend introduced it to me.) I'm such a damn nut for this shit, I even bought a Kaneki Ken body-pillow. Yeah, punks, laugh it up—you damn well know he's waifu material, don't try and deny. However! I failed as a fan when :Re began to come out and I've just never caught up since that point. Hoping this fic will inspire me to do just that.

* * *

 **Hook—Line— & Sinking**

* * *

You can never get that smell out of your head; the smell of death reeking in the air like a stagnant cloud hanging in the sky on the bleakest day of the year and the darkest hour.

It sticks with you. It permeates through the smells you try to replace it with. Try as hard as you might, attempts to chance it will only backfire—the cheap cotton candy perfume will take on a new sickly sweet tinge and the bitterness will be hard to swallow. Sticking, drenching, _consuming._

It's strange, that the oddest things can force you into recalling the moment it first entered into your sinuses.

I can remember it very well.

I was five when I watched my father kill an old woman, the very one who had walked me home just days before when he was late to pick me up from school. The very one with hair like the top of a q-tip, her face just a mere flaky white base for the cotton that her white hair reminded me of. I hadn't really known her, but my father did. He knew that—and he would explain this to me the moment I could conceive the understanding of what a mercy kill was. She had cancer in her pancreas.

Death, my father made sure I knew, was painless to her.

As ghouls, we have to take in what we must to survive. It just so happens I got the side of the coin that meant I was to be the predator to the humans I inevitably found friendships in. (That I inevitably found enemies in.) If that was all it was, it might have all been easier.

But I think, even now, that the truth of the matter is more complicated.

I am not a predator. More than anything, I have always been suited to something different.

My brother has always called me bait.

* * *

"Are you sure you can walk me home?" I ask softly, gazing into dark eyes. I have to remind myself that it is all an act. A charade with which would soon end. Tilting my head just so, looking through my lashes and angling my mouth in the way I practiced—an expression that rarely failed to do what I wanted.

His smile looks like dust from a chalkboard. (Something to be wiped away in an instant.)

"Of course. I'll worry if not," he murmurs and I have to pull away from him for a moment.

He is also an impressive actor.

To pretend to be so kind and yet so cruel on the inside...

I'm sure our similarities don't stop there.

"Risana-chan."

I pause at his sudden use of my name and meet his gaze with questions unasked.

"My, you really are so cute," he whispers, reaching a hand out to touch me. His fingers, cold as they are, cascade down my cheekbone and trail down toward to the base of my chin. I swallow, nonplussed as I attempt to keep my thoughts from showing on my face.

Perhaps I am doing too good of a job.

Withholding a sigh, I capture his hand in mine.

"My father will be expecting me," I lie and as smoothly as I can, I latch our fingers together and begin to walk towards the direction I'd promised to meet my brother at. His fingers are warm in my palm and the beat of his pulse against my wrist is enough to get me salivating. I don't shun the thought—anything that takes the hesitation from me is something I gladly accept.

Nevertheless, I don't allow myself to meet his gaze and return his humanity. For now, he is as I have been hunting him for; a meal.

Something to eat tonight and fill my stomach with for the first time in weeks.

"There's a shortcut down this way," I murmur, my voice a soft whisper as I shift the both of us toward the alleyway. The sound of the crowded streets grows distant the farther we travel in and I'm reminded of different sounds that I had nights previous. Cries for distant help and dispassionate grunts—he really was so intolerable being kept alive.

I bow my head and don't dare look up.

If I do, he will most assuredly be met with the look of tell-tale hungry eyes, and the jig will be up.

I swallow, trying not to focus my thoughts on his smell. I can imagine already the scent of lightly seared flesh cut off the shoulder and the thought reminds me of the flavor I have been missing. Tangy warmth, tickled by the aroma of coffee beans.

"Risana—."

"Aniki," I interrupt, impatient. I shift my head, flashing my eyes around in hopes of spotting him. "How much longer are you going to take?"

"What are you talking about?" the meal asks, blinking at me just in time to notice my gaze.

My eyes are drawn to his throat most of all. Ahh, after all these years it never does stop being a favorite of mine to nibble on. I lick my lips in recollection of past meals.

"Ah, ah, good things come to girls who wait," Joji murmurs close behind me, appearing as quietly as he always has. I don't turn to face him, eyes still captive by the sight of prey cowering in fear. It puts a bad taste in my mouth but the thrill is still undeniable—he may be scum but he is still in good-shape for eating.

I breathe out in anticipation.

"Honestly," Joji sounds distinctly jokingly annoyed, "you're the more dangerous out of us and you still get me to do all the dirty work."

"You enjoy it," I remind him, tuning out the begging voice that gets cut off as Joji extends a hand to shut it up. His eyes scream for him instead but I don't look too closely—I don't allow the gut feeling of pity to take hold in the pit of my stomach. Nor do I allow the tears welling at my eyes to fall.

"And one day, I hope to see you loving it just as much," he whispers, voice cold and as sharp as any knife I'd felt against my skin.

"Hurry," I beg, not wanting to see him alive any longer.

"Of course—you're not the only one of us starving."


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** Yo. I'm winging it.

* * *

 **Hook—Line— & Sinking**

* * *

If God were real, I don't like to imagine that any of us were created in his image.

There has to be a point that sets us apart from Him. Something different than just us having the ability to die and be at the mercy of His inspection. If anything, it can't be that we are cruel and He is not. After all, there is no such existence to be called kind when it is my existence that has been created from it.

 _Thou shalt not kill_ —the words echo in my ears with the sound of deceit.

What sort of short-sighted god ever could conceive such a demand?

Perhaps it was one of the many things mistranslated over the many years since the creation of the book.

"Thou _must_ kill," I correct, watching the meat sizzle on the pan. The scent wafts closer to my nose and I inhale deeply. In the moment, I don't think of where it has come from. I can only await eagerly for it to fry as I keep a careful watch on it.

I smile and try not to salivate.

How I must look to others...

I sigh at the pointlessly self-conscious thought.

If I am to be judged by others as I have judged them, I'm sure my rating would be low enough to sink six feet under soft overturned dirt.

* * *

"Risa-chan, have fun at school," Mama calls to me and I press a kiss to my palm before blowing it at her. Her expression softens as she raises her hand to catch it before placing it to her lips. "Mwuah!"

"Bye bye," I call to her, waving as I slip on my shoes and out the door.

Outside, I breathe in and exhale slowly. Pressing my fingertips to the sign of my pulse on my wrist, I center on calming my thoughts without making it obvious that I might as well be having a panic attack.

I hate first days of school, especially in new places.

Attempting to hum a gentle tune to check for a shake in my voice, I set off towards the place I know will be a form of hell.

I can already feel the eyes of curious classmates, can already hear the whispers in their attempt to speculate my history. They'll notice first that I'm not entirely Japanese—being taller than the average girl and for the shape of my eyes taking more after my Scandinavian father.

Then, beyond that, they'll talk about how eerily quiet I am.

After all, I won't be talking with any of them—while Father is strong enough to form attachments and bonds with humans, I have never been. How scary, how tedious, how disgusting it would be for me. It's something so difficult; having love for what you know won't last long.

In other words, I can never be friends with pigs on a farm.

" _Ahh._ "

Not for the first time that morning, I find myself sending a prayer to the cloudy skies.

 _I wish you were here, Papa._

It smells like it will rain today.

* * *

When introductions have passed and I'm seated in my chair, I find that the center of my calm has returned. I'm in familiar territory—in the back of the class with only a spare few able to sneak glances my way. I still hear the whispers but I'm thankful to be sat in the corner with a window to gaze outward.

Something to take my mind off it.

"Kirishima-kun, please look after the new student," the teacher says and I can't help the impulse to glance to my right—the desk in front of me. A girl turns to look at me and nods in acknowledgement, her gaze shadowed by a long fringe.

I feel a twinge inside me and it's not of hunger.

 _Could it be?_ I wonder, now looking more closely at the back of Kirishima's head. It has a nice shape but it doesn't give me any answers.

I decide, after the second time she shifts slightly to look back at me, that I will have to get her alone later and ask.

Later comes in the form of lunchtime and from the looks we've been exchanging, I'm almost certain she's of the same kind as me.

A ghoul.

It's not all the time that I'm so lucky as to have one as a classmate.

Most ghouls, especially in Japan, don't pursue anything beyond the mandatory minimum of middle school. Some, because their parents are rich with connections and resources, and others because it's easier to go right to work.

Joji is like that—he'd much rather work labor jobs than sit inside all day surrounded by a feast one could not dare touch. Never minding, of course, that Mama makes enough money with her job as a prosecutor that he didn't need to bother. She might even like it more, actually, for her children to forever rely on her.

A reason to keep living.

I wonder what it is that motivates Touka—a name I'd overheard a human girl calling her—to stick with her studies.

I think a rare thought; that it'd be nice if we could be friends.

She meets my gaze and tilts her chin towards the door, raising a brow. No one notices when she does it and I take it as a sign to be just as subtle. I give a slow nod, playing it off as if I were feeling just a bit sleepy. Out of the corner of my eye, she flashes three fingers by her thigh and rises with excuses directed at the human girl from earlier.

 _Three minutes_ , I assume it means.

In the space of time, I can't help but pay closer attention to the girl who continues to happily eat her boxed lunch. There's a second one that appears half eaten and I raise a brow. At this point, I'm already convinced Touka is a ghoul but more than that, I know where she will be when I go to look for her.

The bathroom.

"Did no one follow you?" Touka asks, visibly ill as she wipes at her mouth with a paper towel. I feel awful just looking at her.

"You must really like that girl," I comment and watch as she tenses. "I'm sure she was happy you were eating with her. I'm honestly impressed. I've never been very good at hiding my revulsion."

"After a while, you get used to it," she says and meets my gaze for once. Still tense, but not completely shutting me out.

I smile. "Very nice to meet you. I'm Risana Haugen—and before you ask, while my mother is Japanese, my father is from Norway."

"Touka Kirishima," she says, cracking a bit of a grin that I nearly miss before it's gone. Like the flight of a bird. "I guess that explains why you're so damn tall."

I fake a laugh and feel my grin broaden. "I hope the both of us can be very good friends."

Touka hums and for a moment, I think she'll say no and that I've made a bad first impression. But seconds later, she nods. I'm not entirely sure how to make of it but I figure it's not too bad. While she isn't smiling, she isn't as tense as she was before. That's worth something.

Of course I know it'll be difficult getting much more out of a ghoul I've only just met. By nature, we were all at our core suspicious of each other.

After all, ghouls don't always make the best friends.

There's something to it that you're always eating, consuming meat that once looked just like you.


End file.
